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Troubleshooting

Each section names a symptom, its usual cause and the solution. If the problem is not listed, see the FAQ or contact O&O support.

Display​

The information is not visible on the desktop​

Cause: The application is not running, the display is on another monitor, the text has no contrast against the wallpaper, or desktop integration does not work on this system.

Solution: Work through these points in order:

  1. Look for the tray icon in the notification area. It may be hidden behind the small arrow. If there is no icon, start OODeskInfo.exe.
  2. Open the Monitor submenu in the tray menu and select the monitor you are looking at, or choose All monitors.
  3. Set View settings → Text color to a fixed color that contrasts with the wallpaper, and set View settings → Opacity of the display to 100 %.
  4. Switch View settings → Show integrated with the Desktop off. The information then appears in a sliding window that does not depend on the desktop.

➡️ Desktop display

The display disappeared after Windows Explorer restarted​

Cause: In desktop-integrated mode the panel is attached to the desktop. When Windows Explorer restarts, O&O DeskInfo detects this and attaches the panel again; in rare cases this does not happen.

Solution: Switch View settings → Show integrated with the Desktop off and on again in the tray menu. This rebuilds the display; the graph history is preserved.

➡️ Integrated with the desktop

Desktop integration does not work with several monitors​

Cause: Desktop integration requires the primary monitor to start at a non-negative X coordinate. If a screen lies to the left of the primary monitor, Windows cannot map the panel onto the desktop background reliably.

Solution: Rearrange the monitors in the Windows display settings so that no screen lies to the left of the primary monitor, or switch to the sliding-window mode.

➡️ Monitor selection

The display is cut off or the columns look unbalanced​

Cause: The profile contains more categories than fit on the screen at the current font size, or categories pinned to a column prevent the automatic balancing.

Solution:

  1. Choose a smaller font size under View settings → Font size.
  2. Remove categories you do not need from the profile.
  3. In the profile editor, set the column of the categories that do not have to stay in a fixed column back to Auto.

➡️ Column layout

The display cannot be clicked​

Cause: This is intended. In desktop-integrated mode the panel is click-through so that it never interferes with the desktop icons. All interaction happens through the tray icon.

Solution: For a clickable window, switch View settings → Show integrated with the Desktop off. The sliding window can be shown and hidden with its tab button or with a left-click on the tray icon.

➡️ Sliding window

Information and values​

Battery values are missing​

Cause: The device has no battery. The battery rows hide themselves on such systems.

Solution: None required. On a notebook, check whether the battery is recognised by Windows.

➡️ System information

GPU utilization is missing​

Cause: Some environments, in particular certain remote desktop sessions, do not provide the data O&O DeskInfo needs. The GPU rows then hide themselves regardless of the profile and of the GPU usage graph setting.

Solution: None required. The rows appear again as soon as the data is available, for example when the session is run locally.

➡️ Performance graphs

A network drive is marked with a cross​

Cause: The drive is currently unreachable: the server is offline, the VPN connection is down, or the credentials have expired. O&O DeskInfo marks the drive instead of waiting for it, so the rest of the display keeps updating.

Solution: Restore the connection to the server. The drive is picked up again automatically as soon as it answers.

➡️ Unresponsive network drives

The network values refer to the wrong adapter​

Cause: O&O DeskInfo uses the adapter it considers active, which is normally the one Windows uses for outbound traffic.

Solution: Select the adapter under Network adapter in the tray menu. Changing the adapter restarts the application.

➡️ Network adapter

Tray menu and settings​

The tray menu is missing entries, or there is no menu at all​

Cause: The configuration file restricts the menu with TrayMenu or IsRestricted. On a company computer this is usually intentional.

Solution: Check the two settings in the configuration file, or ask the IT department.

➡️ TrayMenu, IsRestricted

A menu entry shows "Custom"​

Cause: The active value does not correspond to any of the presets in the menu because it was set in the configuration file. The entry is purely informative; clicking it does nothing.

Solution: Select one of the presets in the menu, or keep the value from the configuration file.

➡️ Configuration file

All settings are gone after editing the configuration file​

Cause: The file could not be parsed, usually because of a missing closing tag or a misspelled element name. O&O DeskInfo saved the broken file with a timestamp and the extension .invalid next to it and started over with default settings.

Solution:

  1. Open the .invalid file in the configuration folder and correct the error.
  2. Copy the corrected values back into OODeskInfo.cfg. O&O DeskInfo applies the file about a second after saving.

➡️ Automatic reloading

The application restarts after a change​

Cause: The settings Monitor, ShowOnAllMonitors, NetworkAdapter and ShowDriveActivity depend on resources that are only initialised once per process. Changing them makes the application restart itself. All other changes rebuild the display and keep the graph history.

Solution: None required. The restart takes a moment and does not change any settings.

➡️ Configuration file

Report a problem​

If the problem persists:

  1. Enable logging with LogEnabled and reproduce the problem. The log is written to %LocalAppData%\OO Software\OO DeskInfo\Logs\OODeskInfo.log.
  2. Use Copy info to clipboard in the tray menu to capture the system data.
  3. Send both to O&O support. The contact options are listed on Support and more from O&O.